Music Builds Togetherness

It has been a decades-long tradition at Gustavus to bring together and honor talented high school instrumentalists in the annual Gustavus Honor Band Festival. Each year the best of the best concert band members from Upper Midwest high schools are selected to come together to rehearse and perform during the two-day event.

This Gustavus festival is unique in many ways: it has been held since 1988; it is and always has been under the direction of Gustavus music professor Douglas Nimmo; and it fosters a sense of community on and off the stage as the honored participants stay overnight on campus.

The 2007 honor band festival, held in November, was distinct in that it was the largest in festival history with 105 students from 51 schools in a four-state area. The main reason for the size of this year’s festival was that so many talented, “high-end” students topped the high school directors’ nomination lists. But, Nimmo said, he intentionally made sure that the size was not so large that it hindered success.

“Gustavus’s Honor Band is different in that we don’t want it to become a ‘massed band’ event. If the band is too large, the term music or musical is not easily applied,” Nimmo said.

“When more than 50 different high school band experiences and 100 different sets of expectations become one experience and one set of expectations it is at that moment we become the Gustavus Honor Band. At that moment, the musicians have new insight about being a serious musician. At that moment they have been changed so much they will never be the same again,” Nimmo explained.

“Students go home with really terrific musical and collegiate experience. This translates into excellent good will, solid recruitment, and lasting memories about Gustavus quality. When a good musician chooses Gustavus, all of the community is benefited,” said Nimmo.

The honor band festival is a rewarding experience for the students but also for Nimmo—even after 19 years. “My job is to invigorate a sense of music community, and the students and I build that community together. The sense of growth and accomplishment that comes from the Gustavus Honor Band experience is, for me, profoundly fulfilling,” he said.

Since the festival’s beginning, Nimmo and the Department of Music have invited high school band directors from Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin, and South Dakota to nominate their best band members to participate in the Gustavus Honor Band. Candidates are selected according to their musical talent, but what sets them apart from the other student musicians is the presence of a few other admirable characteristics.

“A good candidate is, of course, a very strong and mature musician, thus the word ‘honor.’ Although I am also interested in a student who has a strong work ethic and who has come with an open and inquisitive mind,” according to Nimmo.

Nimmo initially organized the honor band festival event with hopes to offer high school student musicians the honor band experience and to spread the good news of Gustavus.